In particular, in the oil industry, this information is fundamental in case of losses from pipelines or fluid discharges from wells for being able to effect interventions for operations on the flow, also remote automated.
In these applications, however, there is often the presence of high pressure flow discharges, thus making it necessary to effect measurements at a significant minimum safety distance in order to guarantee the safety of the measuring equipment.
Considering, in addition, the poor visibility available in an underwater environment, it is impossible to effect the measurements at these safety distances with optical sensors such as cameras or lasers.
The use of an acoustic sensor is therefore currently known, such as for example a sonar, transported by underwater vehicles close to the area to be inspected in particular for identifying leakages along a pipe.
Although the use of an acoustic sensor has proved to be valid in recognizing the presence of single-phase and multiphase flows, either gas- or oil-based, this technique however is not capable of providing a sufficient degree of accuracy with respect to determining the position of the flow discharge.
In particular, as the overall measurement error is proportional to the measurement distance, the measurements effected at minimum safety distances provide an error which does not allow an automated intervention.